


bending at the heart of me

by unveils



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: F/M, pining! my niche apparently
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-21
Updated: 2016-06-21
Packaged: 2018-07-16 09:53:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7263184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unveils/pseuds/unveils
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her hair is getting longer, and Fenris realizes, belatedly, that he is in love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	bending at the heart of me

**Author's Note:**

> a secret santa gift for my friend, eva!

Her hair is getting longer. 

It’s not something he notices right away (it’s hardly as if he has the time for such self indulgence between the jobs she drags him into), but rather something he can’t help but take note of as the days turn to weeks, and the weeks turn to months. 

Hawke has a habit of cutting it herself, he knows -- he’s seen her do it.  _ “It gets in the way,”  _ she’d told him once with a laugh (the sharp burn of the campfire highlighting her bright eyes and familiar smile), when he’d been foolish enough to let his gaze linger on the hand she held her knife with.

That’d been years ago, when he’d been allowed such trivialities. When he didn’t have to stutter over the bare necessities pulled from his mouth in the midst of battle. When the tease of a lingering gaze from either party wasn’t something forbidden, but rather, sought after. 

That’d been years ago. Now they’re at opposite ends of the table, the stale air of the Hanged Man buzzing around them with the slight buzz that always comes with the aftermath of a battle. Hawke’s hands are moving on reflex as she laughs (Varric’s mouth close to her ear), swiping at the uneven mop of a thing hanging heavy over her eyes.

It’s the kind of cut a noblewoman would surely scoff at -- Kirkwall or Tevinter-born -- but he thinks, briefly, as he lifts his drink to his mouth, that it suits her.

She catches him staring long after the moment has passed (unsurprising; she’s always been a perceptive woman), and offers nothing but an unreadable smile before returning to her own drink, placing herself back into the conversation with Varric. Louder, this time, now that the mage has invited himself in. 

Isabela pulls his attention not a moment later, tips two fingers underneath his chin for some game she and Merrill are undoubtedly playing that involves more show than tell. She tosses him a saucy wink before sliding the shot glass between them forward, and for the moment, he lets himself forget about Hawke.

 

///

 

It’s a silly thing, he thinks. An impossible thing, he might’ve thought, before he met her. To care about someone so much that it sticks to you like a second layer of skin, no matter how hard you fret and twist to shed it off. 

But Hawke is different.

As the night grows thin, their company disbands. She waits for him by the door as she so often does these days (even when the conversation inevitably grows stale and distant), leaning heavily against her staff.  

(“I hardly think you need my protection, Hawke.” He’d told her, once, and she’d smiled at the stars. 

“Oh,  _ I’m  _ not the one who needs protecting. My heart goes out to any thug who has the misfortune of meeting the end of your blade after midnight.”)

Tonight, he’s had too much to drink, and he attempts, in vain, to wave her off. As luck would have it, though, she’s had as much as he has (if not  _ more _ ), and she simply strings one of her arms through his own and begins to tug. He grumbles for it, but stills in his protesting, and they stumble into the night after a hefty wave from Varric. 

The walk is mostly silent, save for Hawke waving greetings to the usual suspects. The sex worker by the Lowtown market, the poison brewer masquerading as a silks salesman in Hightown. 

He tries to find words for the ‘goodbye’ knotting in his throat when they approach her door. She watches him fumble, for a moment, with a smile, before leaning close, as if to whisper a secret. “Normally, this is where you’d say ‘goodnight’, Fenris.” 

His face pinches and she smiles even wider for that, lets herself be pushed (not without a peal of laughter) against the weight of the wooden door behind her when he goes for it -- playful, in its original intention. Their eyes meet, and the fight leaves him, but her smile does not. 

“Goodnight.” She says, soft, but his gaze drifts to the heavy tendrils of black hanging around her face.

He lifts his hand, folds a strand of it between his fingers and instantly feels a gush of her breath on his chin, warm. It’s too close, he knows, he’s teetering -- the alcohol in his system burning away the walls he’s worked so hard to put up since -- 

Since before. He hates himself so suddenly it borders on an outside kind of anger, and he twists his forehead towards her own to feel her close to him. He feels her exhale, and she presses a hand to his shoulder. 

“Hawke,” he says, as if voicing it will ground him as it has so many times in the past. 

He doesn’t miss the way she hesitates (a quick flicker of something burning in her eyes, too brief--) before moving to catch his hand in her own free one. It’s not a crushing grip, but there’s a weight that holds it steady, draws it from her face as she breathes, against his cheek, his chin -- 

“You don’t have to force it, Fenris.”

He snarls at that, shoving backwards. Taking steps to feel the ground beneath his feet. There are a hundred ways to tell her that there’s nothing  _ forced _ about how the sight of her smiling tonight made him feel, that the only thing  _ forced  _ about any of this at all is the way he’s keeping his fingers from moving to grip the sharp curve of her cheekbone, to press her fully against the door of her estate and take her lips.

He softens, visibly, at the thought (too angry, too harsh for her, for Hawke, for the constant warmth she gives him) -- feels the shame pull thick through his veins, an instant deterrent to quell the flood of heat in his chest. 

“Getting late.” Her voice is even, he notes. “No bandits to be found.” 

“Your hair--” He mutters -- voice still carrying a kind of frustration, a brush off --, before the heat leaves him entirely. She stops, and he sways his gaze to the ground, unable to meet her eyes. “I like it.” 

There’s a moment of silence before he turns to go, and he can hear the sigh in her voice when she calls after him. 

  
“Fenris,” a beat. “It was a good night.” 


End file.
